Daniel D. Badger
Encyclopedia
Daniel D. Badger was an American founder
Foundry
A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal in a mold, and removing the mold material or casting after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals processed are aluminum and cast iron...
, working in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
under the name Architectural Iron Works. With James Bogardus
James Bogardus
James Bogardus was an American inventor and architect, the pioneer of American cast-iron architecture, for which he took out a patent in 1850...
, he was one of the major forces in creating a cast-iron architecture
Cast-iron architecture
Cast-iron architecture is a form of architecture where cast iron plays a central role. It was a prominent style in the Industrial Revolution era when cast iron was relatively cheap and modern steel had not yet been developed.-Structural use:...
in the United States. Christopher Gray
Christopher Gray
Christopher Gray is an American journalist and architectural historian noted for his weekly New York Times column "Streetscapes", about the history of New York architecture, real estate and public improvements...
of the New York Times remarks: "Most cast-iron buildings present problems of authorship – it is hard to tell if it was the founder or the architect who actually designed the facade."
Badger's illustrated catalogues of cast-iron architectural elements provided the most extensive and ambitious offering of them in 19th-century America. Originally intended as an advertising device, the catalogue issued in 1865 was reprinted in 1981, with an introduction by Margot Gayle, and was digitized in 2011 by the Internet Archive with the support of the New York chapter of the Victorian Society of America.
Life and career
Badger was born in 1806 to a shipbuilding family on Badger's IslandBadger's Island
Badger's Island is located in the Piscataqua River at Kittery, Maine, directly opposite Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It carries U.S. Route 1 between the states, connecting to the Kittery mainland by the Badger's Island Bridge, and to New Hampshire by the Memorial Bridge...
in the harbor of Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Portsmouth is a city in Rockingham County, New Hampshire in the United States. It is the largest city but only the fourth-largest community in the county, with a population of 21,233 at the 2010 census...
, and worked in a blacksmith
Blacksmith
A blacksmith is a person who creates objects from wrought iron or steel by forging the metal; that is, by using tools to hammer, bend, and cut...
's shop in Portsmouth until he set up in Woburn, Massachusetts
Woburn, Massachusetts
Woburn is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, USA. The population was 38,120 at the 2010 census. Woburn is located north of Boston, Massachusetts, and just south of the intersection of I-93 and I-95.- History :...
, as a maker of saws. Following a fire, he invested his savings in a foundry and rolling mill in Boston, where he was very successful. As a "black and white smith", he was admitted in 1837 as a member of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. He was described as a "housesmith" in Boston, Massachusetts, when he set up a storefront of cast-iron columns and lintels in 1842, with the proviso in the contract that if the untried new material were to prove unsuccessful he would substitute the usual granite piers. Later he claimed grandly that he was "the first person who practically used Iron for the building material of an exterior", though the historian of cast-iron architecture
Cast-iron architecture
Cast-iron architecture is a form of architecture where cast iron plays a central role. It was a prominent style in the Industrial Revolution era when cast iron was relatively cheap and modern steel had not yet been developed.-Structural use:...
in America, Margot Gayle, observes "the claim clearly cannot stand scrutiny". Badger acquired the patent of Arthur L. Johnson of Baltimore for rolling iron shopfront shutters, which he made ubiquitous as "Badger fronts". In 1846 he removed to New York, where his Boston partner Charles Reed soon joined him. An early handbill shows Badger's early four-storey brick factory at 44 Duane Street, New York, as it was shortly after 1848. His later foundry occupied the whole block in the East Village
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, lying east of Greenwich Village, south of Gramercy and Stuyvesant Town, and north of the Lower East Side...
from 13th to 14th Streets and Avenues B to C.
Badger's Architectural Iron Works sent prefabricated cast-iron elements as far afield as Havana
Havana
Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...
and Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
. Under his contract for the cast iron for the first Grand Central Depot (opened 1871), he erected the second-widest cast-iron span in the world at the time; the train shed was erected rapidly through the use of a traveling stage, upon which the arched girders were successively erected. Shortly thereafter, he erected the cast-iron Manhattan Market, with an arched girder roof, using the same traveling stage.
Badger was also one of the founding partners of the New York Sanitary and Chemical Compost Manufacturing Company (incorporated 1864) for the purpose of manufacturing street-cleaning equipment and the composting of fertilizing manure
Manure
Manure is organic matter used as organic fertilizer in agriculture. Manures contribute to the fertility of the soil by adding organic matter and nutrients, such as nitrogen, that are trapped by bacteria in the soil...
s from the horse manure and other refuse of city streets.
Badger retired in 1873, and died in 1884.
Surviving works
In New York today, the most prominent surviving buildings for which Badger fabricated the cast iron are:- E. V. Haughwout BuildingE. V. Haughwout BuildingThe E.V. Haughwout Building is a five-story, 79-foot tall, commercial loft building in the SoHo section of Manhattan, New York City, at the corner of Broome Street and Broadway. Built in 1857 to a design by John P. Gaynor, with cast-iron sections for two street-fronts provided by Daniel D....
(John P. Gaynor, architect, 1856–57), at Broadway and Broome Street; - Cary BuildingCary Building (New York City)The five-storey Cary Building is a cast-iron fronted building with twin facades on Chambers Street and Reade Street in New York City. The partnership of Gamaliel King and John Kellum was apparently responsible for its design, which was cast in Daniel D. Badger's Architectural Iron Works in...
(Gamaliel KingGamaliel KingGamaliel King was an American architect who practiced in New York City and the adjacent city of Brooklyn, where he was a major figure in Brooklyn civic and ecclesiastical architecture for several decades.His practice began as a "builder" in Brooklyn in the 1820s: in 1823 he and Joseph Moser were...
and John KellumJohn KellumJohn Kellum was an American architect in practice in New York City.Kellum, born in Hempstead, Long Island, was trained as a carpenter; he was largely self-taught in architecture, and was taken into partnership in 1846 by the well-established New York architect Gamaliel King...
architects, 1856) at 106 Chambers Street, designated a New York City landmark in 1982; - Condict saddlery Store (John KellumJohn KellumJohn Kellum was an American architect in practice in New York City.Kellum, born in Hempstead, Long Island, was trained as a carpenter; he was largely self-taught in architecture, and was taken into partnership in 1846 by the well-established New York architect Gamaliel King...
& son, architects, 1861), at 55-57 White Street, designated a New York City landmark in 1988, the largest extant cast-iron "sperm-candle" design, where the two-story columns recall candles made of sperm-whale oil - 319 Broadway, the former Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Home Office (David and John JardineDavid and John JardineThe brothers David , John E. and George Elliott Jardine were architects of Scottish nationality, sons of a Scottish architect-builder of Whithorn, Wigtownshire; they took up American citizenship and practiced in New York City, forming "one of the more prominent, prolific and versatile...
, architects, 1869–70) at Thomas Street, designated a New York City landmark in 1989.
Other extant buildings which feature facades cast by Badger include:
- Gilsey HouseGilsey HouseGilsey House is a former eight-story 300-room hotel located at 1200 Broadway at East 29th Street in the NoMad neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City...
(Stephen Decatur HatchStephen Decatur HatchStephen Decatur Hatch was a prominent late-19th century architect who was responsible for a number of historically or architecturally significant buildings in Manhattan, New York City and elsewhere...
, architect, 1869–71), designated a New York City landmark in 1979, a former hotel on Broadway at East 29th Street with an elaborate cast-iron curtain wallCurtain wallA curtain wall is an outer covering of a building in which the outer walls are non-structural, but merely keep out the weather. As the curtain wall is non-structural it can be made of a lightweight material reducing construction costs. When glass is used as the curtain wall, a great advantage is...
; - "Little Cary Building" (John B. SnookJohn B. SnookJohn B[utler] Snook was an American architect who practiced in New York City.Born in England, Snook emigrated to the United States with his family as a child. He was trained as a carpenter in his father's carpentry business, and was largely self-taught as an architect...
, architect, 1858), 620 Broadway between Bleecker and Houston Streets, received its modern nickname because of its similarity to the Cary Building; - 90-94 Maiden LaneMaiden Lane (Manhattan)Maiden Lane is an east-west street in the Financial District of the New York City borough of Manhattan. Its eastern terminus is at South Street, near the South Street Seaport...
(attributed to Charles Wright, architect, 1870-1871), designated a New York City landmark in 1989, one of a small number of buildings in lower Manhattan which date from the mid-1800s. - 50 Warren Street (architect unknown, c.1860)
Badger's cast legends D.D. Badger &Co. NY and ARCHITECTURAL IRON WORKS can still be found at the base of store-front details throughout Manhattan's SoHo
SoHo
SoHo is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City, notable for being the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, and also, more recently, for the wide variety of stores and shops ranging from trendy boutiques to outlets of upscale national and international chain stores...
– including the SoHo-Cast Iron Historic District – and NoHo
NoHo
NoHo, for North of Houston Street is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, roughly bounded by Houston Street on the south, The Bowery on the east, Astor Place on the north, and Broadway on the west. NoHo is wedged between Greenwich Village, west of Broadway, and the East Village...
neighborhoods.